The Final Leap

“Grim, yes, but also fascinating.”

— Marin Magazine

“Here is the full story of why a famed structure draws folks set on death, nicely timed for the Golden Gate’s 75th anniversary.”

— American History

“The great strength of Leap is in illustrating the hundreds of lives touched by each bridge suicide: the witnesses who watch people plunge to their deaths; the Golden Gate Station Coast Guard officers who rescue the bodies — and who suffer an outsize rate of attrition because of the trauma; the coroners who perform autopsies. Bateson is a gifted writer, and he treats his subject matter in a way that manages to be uncommonly tender without ever veering into mawkishness or melodrama. But with a debate revolving around how best to address the issue, the book is as much about activism as it is about documentation: Bateson is a vociferous proponent of a suicide barrier on the bridge, and hopes that The Final Leap — which spends a great deal of time laying out, and efficiently knocking down, the arguments that have long been floated against the barrier — will raise momentum.”

— East Bay Express

"Grim, yes, but also fascinating."

— Marin Magazine